Working on a voice app? Check out Dave Rupert’s Anthology of Mute Buttons in Voice Chat Apps and get an excellent overview of all the confusing ways the mute function is presented. Mute has existed for a long time, we all use it, but it is so hard to get right.

He really is on to something with the push to talk idea. That should really be the default for conference calls and group chats.

I was going to use one of the popular frameworks for a very little project when three things conspired to put me on a different path. One was a problem of my own doing: I seemed to have hosed my NPM installation whilst trying to upgrade something. Then I read these two posts, which really came at the right time:

I have a suspicion that there’s a silent majority of developers who are working with “boring” technologies on “boring” products in “boring” industries …you know, healthcare, government, education, and other facets of everyday life that any other industry would value more highly than Uber for dogs.

Anyway, I got an initial version of my tiny project done in a couple hours. I’d still be fighting with the framework if I had continued in the original direction. I’m sure I’ll get my NPM fixed, and I’m sure I’ll use a framework in the future, but I’m glad I gave myself permission to just hack this thing out in very, very basic HTML, CSS and a few lines of JS.